A scored welding process and quality audit for a fabrication shop or a supplier: the codes and specifications worked to, quality organization and stop-work authority, written procedures and their qualification records, a sample of welders checked for qualification and continuity, base metal and filler traceability to mill certificates, electrode ovens and wire and flux storage, calibration of machines and measuring tools, joint preparation, fit-up, preheat and interpass control, heat treatment, a sample of finished welds inspected visually, NDT, weld maps, nonconformance review, findings classified major or minor, and sign-off.
Audit Details
Whose shop, why you are auditing, and which codes govern the work.
Audit title
Fabricator or facility audited
Facility address
Auditing company
Lead auditor
Audit date
Type of audit — New supplier approval, Scheduled surveillance, Internal audit, Follow-up after a quality problem, Pre-award or pre-job review
Products, parts or jobs in scope
Codes and specifications the work is built to — AWS D1.1 (steel), AWS D1.2 (aluminum), AWS D1.3 (sheet steel), AWS D1.6 (stainless), AWS D17.1 (aerospace), ASME Section IX, ISO 3834, Military specification, Customer specification, Other
Welding processes in use — Stick (SMAW), MIG (GMAW), Flux-cored (FCAW), TIG (GTAW), Submerged arc (SAW), Resistance or spot, Orbital or automated, Brazing
Number of welders and welding operators
Number of weld inspectors
Shop representative and role
Quality Organization
Who owns quality, who can stop the work, and whether the shop has what it builds to.
Is there a current quality manual or written procedures that cover welding and inspection? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Do the people responsible for quality report separately from those responsible for output? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Do quality inspectors have written authority to stop work and hold nonconforming product? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Is a certified welding inspector, or equivalent qualified person, on staff or under contract? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are in-house NDT personnel qualified and certified under a written practice? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are outside services — heat treating, NDT, coating, testing labs — approved by a documented evaluation? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are current, controlled copies of the codes and customer specifications ticked above available to the people who use them? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are revised or cancelled drawings withdrawn from the shop floor, with only the current revision in use? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are questions and deviations from the customer's requirements raised and answered in writing? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Procedures and Welder Qualification
Written procedures, the tests behind them, and the welders using them.
Is there a written welding procedure for every production joint, backed by a qualification record or prequalified status? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are the procedures at or near the workstations, and do the welders know which one applies? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Is there a current record of each welder's qualification tests, with the variables they cover? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Is continuity tracked, so a welder who has not used a process within the code's limit is retested? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are annual vision checks recorded for welders and inspectors where the code or contract requires them? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Can every production weld be traced to the welder who made it — by stamp, log or traveler? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Does this work call for nondestructive testing beyond visual inspection?
NDT methods in use — Radiography (RT), Ultrasonic (UT), Phased array (PAUT), Magnetic particle (MT), Penetrant (PT), Leak or pressure test
Is each NDT method done to a written, approved procedure? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Do NDT reports name the weld, the acceptance criteria and the result, and are they signed by a qualified person? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Is the sampling rate (for example, 10% of welds) the one the contract sets, with extra testing when rejects turn up? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Records and Nonconformance
What the shop can show after the welds are painted and shipped.
Are weld maps or logs kept for structural and critical jobs, linking each weld to welder, procedure and inspection? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are inspection records signed, dated and retained for the period the contract requires? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Is there a formal review — a material review board or equivalent — that dispositions rejected welds? — Pass, Fail, N/A
What is wrong, and where
Are weld repairs done to a procedure and re-inspected the same way as the original? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Are repeat defects investigated for cause, with corrective actions tracked to closure? — Pass, Fail, N/A
Records reviewed (job numbers, report numbers)
Findings and Sign-Off
The audit result, the findings for the shop to answer, and signatures.
Audit result — Approved, Approved — findings to close, Approval withheld until findings close, Not approved
Corrective actions
What has to be done
Where, or which item
Urgency — Major, Minor, Observation
Person responsible
Due date
Date closed
Photo
Shop to reply with its corrective action plan by
Strengths and other comments
Lead auditor — signature
Shop representative — name
Shop representative — signature
Manufacturing
Welding Quality Audit
A scored welding process and quality audit for a fabrication shop or a supplier: the codes and specifications worked to, quality organization and stop-work authority, written procedures and their qualification records, a sample of welders checked for qualification and continuity, base metal and filler traceability to mill certificates, electrode ovens and wire and flux storage, calibration of machines and measuring tools, joint preparation, fit-up, preheat and interpass control, heat treatment, a sample of finished welds inspected visually, NDT, weld maps, nonconformance review, findings classified major or minor, and sign-off.
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This audit is about the quality of the welds. For the safety of the people making them — fumes, leads, cylinders, fire and arc flash — use: Welding safety inspection
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A welding quality audit checks whether a fabricator can make the same sound weld every time and prove it afterwards. It looks past the finished part to the system behind it: the codes the shop works to, written procedures and the tests that qualified them, welders who are current, filler metal that can be traced to its certificate, electrodes kept dry, machines that read true, joints prepared and preheated as written, welds inspected at the right moment, and defects that go through a proper review. This checklist scores each item Pass, Fail or N/A, samples welders and welds individually, and ends with findings classified for the shop to answer. Fill it in here and download a PDF, or speak while you walk, and the document writes itself.
Who uses a welding quality audit
Buyers use it to approve a new fabrication supplier or to recheck one after a quality problem. Quality managers use it as an internal audit of their own shop before a customer or certifying body arrives. Owners' inspectors use it at the start of a structural steel or pressure job to see whether the fabricator's system will hold up.
The form works whichever code the shop builds to. Pick the codes and specifications in the first section; the checks are written in terms every welding code shares — a written procedure, a qualified welder, controlled filler metal, measured heat, and inspection against stated acceptance criteria.
Sample the welders and the welds
A shop can show you a binder of qualification records and still have a welder on the floor whose qualification lapsed last spring. The audit samples people and parts directly: pick welders who are working today and check each one's qualification and recent continuity, then pick finished welds and inspect them against the drawing and the acceptance criteria.
Each sample is its own entry and scored on its own, so a failure names the welder or the weld. That makes the finding specific enough for the shop to fix rather than argue about.
Consumables and heat: where quality is usually lost
Low-hydrogen electrodes that sat out overnight, flux that picked up moisture, a filler with no certificate, preheat guessed rather than measured: these cause cracking and porosity that may not show until a weld fails in service or under NDT. The audit spends real time in the stores and at the workstation for that reason, checking the ovens, the issue process and the temperature-measuring tools in use.
Findings and the shop's response
Each failed check becomes a finding in the report summary. Add corrective actions classified as major (a weld or a process that cannot be relied on), minor (a lapse in a system that otherwise works) or observation, each with an owner and a due date. On the follow-up visit, the re-inspection starts from that list.
Common questions
What is the difference between a welding quality audit and a welding inspection?
A welding inspection looks at particular welds and decides whether they meet the acceptance criteria. An audit looks at the system that produces them — procedures, qualifications, materials, equipment, records — and samples welds as evidence that the system works.
Does this checklist include the requirements of AWS D1.1, ASME Section IX or ISO 3834?
No. It names those codes as options so you can record which apply, but it does not reproduce their requirements. Each check asks whether the shop meets the code it works to; judge that against the code itself.
How many welders and welds should I sample?
Enough to see the system working across processes and shifts. Many auditors pick two or three welders per process in use and a handful of welds per product line, then add more where the first samples raise a question.
Who should carry out a welding quality audit?
Someone who knows welding processes and the governing codes, typically a certified welding inspector, a welding engineer, or a supplier quality engineer with welding experience.
How often should a fabricator be audited?
Before a supplier is first approved, then on a schedule set by risk — often yearly for critical work — and again after a significant quality failure, a change of ownership or key staff, or a move to new premises.